The city, interpreted as a complex dynamic system, is experiencing
ungovernable levels of entropic growth related to locally-based human activities.
Indeed, the main antagonist of urban sustainability is anthropogenic entropy. The
general crisis is due to the production of entropy within single urban subsystems,
which is transmitted, with a ripple effect, to all the others and to the entire city.
Due to endogenous malfunctioning in its parts or in its structure, a subsystem can
be viewed as an \“entropic generator” and can trigger a chain of damage that can
lead to the collapse of the entire urban system. The urban crisis can thus be
linked to the entropy produced, especially within the human subsystem. In order
to start appropriate processes that gear the structure of the urban system towards
sustainability measures, it is first necessary to reduce urban entropy. New
procedures are being developed to plan sustainable cities which, in a cyclical
process, are also rooted in social capital. Entropy can be distinguished in directaction,
expressed as soil use (how, where, for how long) and entropy-induced
action which is carried out by the activities producing air, electromagnetic noise,
water pollution. This paper, also starting from the studies developed by E. Tiezzi
and the paper by F. Muller (presented at \“Sustainable city 2010” in La Coruňa),
seeks to identify the characteristics of anthropogenic entropy in order to propose
the adoption of a new \“urban ethic” which has to become one of the determinants
of eco-town planning.
Keywords: sustainable city, complex system, systemic approach, entropy, ecotown
planning.